1. Technical Field
The present disclosure relates generally to wireless communication service and, more particularly, to a wireless communication system, and an apparatus and method for controlling communication connections with a plurality of user terminals in the system, which are capable of minimizing connection time upon establishing communication connections between a beacon device and a plurality of terminal devices via wireless communication, thereby preventing the terminal devices from missing beacon signals broadcast by the beacon device.
2. Description of the Related Art
This section is not intended to be an admission of prior art, but is intended to simply provide background information related to embodiments.
With the development of mobile communication networks and the advancement of terminal specifications, mobile communication terminals have become the necessities of people today and are evolving into total entertainment devices, beyond the scope of conventional simple communication devices or information provision devices.
Furthermore, technologies for enabling mobile communication terminals to perform short-range wireless communication over a short distance have rapidly developed. One of these short-range wireless communication technologies is a Bluetooth communication technology.
The Bluetooth communication technology has evolved continuously. Recently, Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) is being widely used in the fields of smart phones, geofencing, mobile payment, etc. BLE consumes lower power than the standard Bluetooth wireless connection technology, and is most recently being chiefly used in various services using short-range wireless communication.
However, a beacon device for performing short-range wireless communication using Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) announces its presence via continuous broadcasting.
A terminal device may receive a broadcast beacon signal, may establish a communication connection with the beacon device, and then may transmit required data.
A problem arises in that, when a communication connection between the terminal device and the beacon device has been established in this manner, the beacon device cannot broadcast a beacon signal anymore, and thus a situation occurs in which another terminal device cannot identify the beacon device when the other terminal device approaches the beacon device.